Frontiers of free enterprise

Marketing of tasers - the gizmos that deliver a paralyzing, 50,000-volt shock to the victim - is expanding. What's being expanded, however, is not so much the marketing as the market. From CBS News in Chicago on Monday:

Taser stun guns are back in the news again. Despite the scores of injuries and deaths associated with the police taser, Taser International, the leading manufacturer of tasers, is now aggressively targeting a new audience and you might be surprised to learn that it's you.

In a promotional taser video, an eerie voice tells potential taser buyers why the X26C is the weapon for them - "It's the most powerful non-lethal weapon ever developed."

Taser International believes the future of the high-tech weapon lies in the millions of citizens who want to protect their homes and families but don't want to buy a firearm.

Yes, that's right, soon you, too, can protect your home! yourself! your family! with the latest thing in high-tech crime deterrence. What's more, there is no background check involved and no training is required! Does that concern you? Don't worry! Taser International is right there in its concern for safety, you betcha: Purchasers of the $1,000 devices are offered one hour of personal instruction and a DVD training video. Both are, of course, entirely voluntary.

I've written about tasers and the questions raised about and by them several times before. And the questions continue to pile up:

- Last fall, Amnesty International, which opposes tasers, issued a report documenting nearly 100 deaths in the US alone since June 2001 from police use of this "non-lethal" weapon. Recently, AI upped that number to 103. (The version sold to police packs more of a wallop and has a longer range than the model intended for general public sale.)

- On Wednesday, AP reported on the case of a 110-pound woman who was tasered nine times in the course of being arrested in a dispute over her stay at a motel in Florida.

- Also on Wednesday, local news told of an Orlando, Florida police officer being charged with misdemeanor battery for tasering a suspect who was tied and handcuffed to a hospital bed in order to force him to give a urine sample.

- Yet again in Florida (Is there a pattern developing here?), on Tuesday a Santa Rosa County sheriff's deputy resigned to avoid being fired for excessive use of force in an incident from August: After a car chase, the suspect pulled over and put both his hands out of his car window, indicating surrender. The deputy walked up to the car and tasered him. He was the second Florida cop to quit under threat of being fired for abusive use of a taser in the last month.

One of the fears critics have about tasers is that, as I've argued previously, they encourage the use of a weapon and the infliction of pain not only in situations where lethal violence otherwise might have been employed but also in situations where no violence otherwise might have been employed. They become weapons of convenience rather than protection. The experiences in Florida seem to confirm precisely those fears.

Footnote: One wonders if this, from Reuters for Wednesday, had anything to do with the decision to broaden the market:

Taser announced Jan. 6 that the SEC was investigating the company over statements about the safety of its stun guns and a distribution deal struck in December 2004.

That deal increased suspicions because it happened late in the fourth quarter and raised questions about when Taser planned to book revenue from the agreement.

Last year Taser was among the hottest stocks on the market. On a split-adjusted basis, Taser shares shot up more than 375 percent, hitting $33.45 Dec. 30.

Ever since news of the SEC investigation, the stock has been on a steady decline. Taser shares closed down 3.3 percent to $7.64 Wednesday.

That's a 77% decline in stock price in less than four months and puts it below where it was before last year's soar. That's not good news. Well, yeah, it is good news. Just not for them.